50pts pButcher (Khador) vs. eDoomy (Trollbloods)

Another weekend rolls around, and I get 2 more games in. This one, and an eMadrak vs. Stryker2 (mirror match, you know?). My opponent had 2 lists, and I have no idea what the other one was, but in my brilliance, I decided I wanted to try the eDoomy brick again without looking at his list at all.

eDoomy
*Mt. King
*Mulg
*Earthborn
Janissa
Min KSB
Sons of Bragg

vs. pButcher. Cool right?

pButcher
*War Dog
*Behemoth
Men of War Demolition Corp
Widowmakers
Kayazy Assassins w/ Underboss
Kayazy Eliminators
Kayazy Eliminators
pEiryss
Doom Reavers w/ UA
Ayaina & Holt

Pretty awesome huh? DEF17 tarpit against everyone's favorite RAT/MAT5 colossal. This is gonna be awesome. So he wins the rolloff, puts the widowmakers on the far left knowing that I'm going to be pushing right to take advantage of the woods I have there (Earthborn animus is great stuff in the forest). The MoW are center with Behemoth and Butcher and the Kayazy go to the right to head directly towards me.

I brick up, slightly to the right. The sons are to the left, more to his center, and everything else is behind eDoomy and his beast line, with the King on the left. Mulg and EBDT are to the right, again, closer to the woods.

He drops the doom reavers, and it's game on. Behemoth gets one to the regular cortex, and everything runs with the exception of butcher, who puts Iron Flesh on the Kayazy. This is the point where I realize I might be in serious trouble.

I also remember to start taking pics.



Mt. King moves up with Mulg, riling for the appropriate number of fury, and the EBDT moves up and puts his animus on one of them. Doomy puts Refuge on the EBDT, Wild Agression on the King, and the EBDT animus (Transmute) onthe King as well (for free), and dumps 2 fury to the stone. The Sons move up, do a 4+ tough, Janissa pops a wall, and the stone moves up and drops aura, getting everyone.



Butcher upkeeps Iron Flesh, and allocates 3 to the Behemoth sub-cortex. Kayazy push forward, and the Doomreavers run to engage me, which bothers me not at all. Widowmakers pump 4 auto-damage shots into the King, who drops 2 whelps, and a unit of Eliminators goes wide on a flank. Everyone else runs forward, except Behemoth who walks forward and is a hair out of range of the King.



Pull in fury, upkeep both WA and refuge. Mt. King twists and sweeps the three doomreavers engaging him, and hits all three, but 1 toughs. He then uses Killshot and sprays the rest of the unit, hitting all three, but only one failing tough. The UA and one doomy are KD though.

The Earthborn charges off after the Kayazy eliminators on the flank, but fails to engage either one of them. He's in the woods, but he has no LOS to anything else in the Khador army.

Mulg shuffles over next to the King, and kills the remaining Doom reavers. The Sons of Bragg move up. Doomy drops the EBDT animus on the King and Mulg both, dumps all but one to the stone. Janissa does her stuff. The two whelps run to stand in the way of things and be annoying.



Kayazy are terribly annoying. Acrobatics, parry, all of it? One AOE wielding beast, and this would have been a mute issue. War Wagon, Bomber, something. Nothing. Butcher upkeeps Iron Flesh again, and puts 3 on the Behemoth again. Subcortex.

The Eliminators on my right charge right past the Earthborn, and engage Doomy, but completely whuff their damage rolls, only doing like, 8 boxes to him. The Widowmakers shoot 4 shots into my double-sword Son of Bragg. I think the Men of War smash the whelps, just getting them with reach, and the Kayazy run to engage the Mt. King. Nothing big, just swallowing him up. Behemoth fires some shots, doing moderate damage, but nothing crazy. The Doomreavers stand up and run away.



Kayazy in melee are DEF16, against melee, not ranged. Add in Iron Flesh, and they are DEF19. I'm in some serious trouble. Doomy upkeeps everything and pulls in fury. The sons of bragg start with Fervor, and Wrathar misses his melee attack, and Tor walks up and sprays 7 of theses dudes. At RAT8, he hits.... 1. Because he wasn't trying for melee attacks, and he ignores Melee penalties, he only needed 9s. I got 1.

Doomy boosts to hit and swings at a Kayazy engaging him, and misses of course. He keeps the rest for transfers, but feats. The Mt. King twists, sweeps, and even with everything boosted, I need 14s to hit. I get 2 of them. With Killshot, I miss everything. Mulg twists and tries to clear off eDoomy, but simply can't, and even boosting to hit, I think he kills just 1.

The EBDT, however, is the hero today. Standing on a forest template, with +2 SPD there from Transmute, +3 SPD from Doomy's feat, +3 for the trample I'm about to do for free (also feat) and base SPD5, the EBDT tramples 13'' into the Men of War, and kills two, goads, and kills 1 more, the Refuges 10'' back into the woods. It was hilarious. I was really happy with the Earthborn.

Janissa drops a wall, trying to stop as many Kayazy from reaching doomy as possible, but it's pretty much pointless. Stone pops Aura, and I call it a day.



Butcher puts 3 focus on Behemoth sub cortex, drops Iron Flesh, and feats (Extra Dice damage for everyone), and puts Fury (+3 Damage) on the Kayazy.

Behemoth cranks some damage into the King, and the Kayazy attack him, and kill him in pretty short order. The Widowmakers make Widows of the Daughters-in-Law of Bragg. A couple of Kayazy get the charge on EBDT with the Doom Reaver that's left, and murder him, and two more get past Mulg, and between them and the sidestepping Eliminators, kill eDoomy. Janissa got hit in there too and toughed, but none of that mattered by the time Doomy died.

Also, note that Mulg is not dead, he's simply setting to the side because there wasn't room for him under the King's giant arm. The blue base is there to denote his presence.



Thoughts on the game:

There's two ways I could have won this.
1. I didn't realize how far my EBDT was going to get. At that point, I was pretty sure I was done for, and I just wanted to see what the Earthborn could do, especially since he failed me in the last Doomy brick game. What I SHOULD have done was trample behind the first Man of War, instead of in front to engage 2 of them at once. Kill the one dude, goad, and spend the next 4 fury trying to kill Butcher. I would have had... 3 fury to do it with? He was ARM20 (including the 2 focus I see in the pic), with a POW8 weapon to be adapted by the Earthborn. PS would have been Dice even. Would have needed 8s to hit, and have to do 20 damage in 3 rolls. Average rolls would get me the damage, but the chances of me missing one of those attacks were pretty high. If I could have gotten Wild Agression on him, it'd of been a done deal, but don't think I had the range on that.

2. Looking back, I screwed up running Mulg hot. I ran him to 5 fury, and left it that way. The way my Opponent eliminated stuff was weird because he never worried about the stone first, even though I think he had ways to reach it (fricking Kayazy). If he'd of dropped the stone first, he'd of had a much easier time killing things. The other thing he did that was weird was kill the Mt. King first. The Mt. King was the only beast I did Not run full fury on, and was therefore the only beast I could have transfered to. When the King died, Doomy had like, 6 fury to transfer with, but no where to go with it, and only a handful of attacks to make it through. If Doomy could have transfered to either the EBDT (I doubt I'd of left him low on fury) or Mulg (More possible), he could have survived, and Mulg was easily in range of killing Butcher. Now, who's to say that if I had left Mulg open a bit, if he wouldn't have focused on killing Mulg. Quite possible, but I think he would have struggled considerably with it at ARM21, and not many Kayazy attacks left.

3. My last turn, I didn't get the EBDT animus on ANYTHING. At the very least, I should have got it on Doomy himself for some extra ARM, but I didn't.

4. Overall, good game, and there were definitely some ways I could have won that if I'd of had my head on straight. My opponent played a great game, and the eliminators way out on the flanks was annoying as heck. There just wasn't enough of my models to deal with all the avenues of attack he had, but that's what his list is for, and he played it awesome. Great game, and I'm looking forward to the next one!

Trollblood War Wagon based and painted

  Finally finished the War Wagon.  I've been piecemealing it together for two months.  By the time I glued it to it's base yesterday, I was fed up with it and ready to finish it.  It still turned out good, but I didn't do any of the excessive modding I had in mind, with the exception of the base.  

  The base is a lot of ballast rocks glued in under corkboark and drybrushed in a determined manner.

   I then proceeded to lay in a bit of clear window caulk, which lays in white, and drys clear.

  Drybrush a bit, leaving a shadow.

  Testing the wagon, which I based orange at first.  Anything with lots of metal, I've been basing orange, then drybrushing my metal on, which gives me a fantastic rusted look that I like a lot.

  Water wasn't deep enough, so I added another layer.

  Then I drybrushed it again, added grass, and called it pretty much done.  

 

  I don't have any wips on the wagon, but it took forever.  I magnetized the gun to it's base for ease of storage... like... a month ago when my brother was magnetizing his Myrmidons.  This thing has been on my painting bench for awhile...

  That's it for this one. Mulg is 80% done, my Sons of Bragg and Kithkar are 90%.  I'm right there, I just keep bouncing back to this project and it's completed finally.  Stay tuned, I've got 2 batreps coming, eDoomy vs. pButcher and eMadrak vs. Stryker2.  

50pts Testament of (Menoth) vs. eDoomy (Trollbloods). Mt. King, come forth!

After my eCaine game, I took on the same Menoth player I played last time. I brought me eDoomy list, because A) I really wanted to field the Mt. King and B) It's a model count of 13. He had the Testament of Menoth, who basically looks like a converted and zealous Bane. I haven't played against the Testament before (I don't think), so this was a new deal for me. On the plus side, the list was really similar to the Reznik1 list I beat with eMadrak, so I knew most of what the units would do, I simply didn't know what the Testament changed about it.

So, our lists:

eDoomy
*Mt. King
*Earthborn
*Mulg
Janissa
KSB min
Sons of Bragg
Whelps

I've never played the eDoomy brick before, but my goal is to find something that works with the Mt. King. The list consistently takes the 3 beasts up to arm 21-23 with the KSB aura and Earthborn animus, has a pretty serious threat range, and is pretty difficult to tear apart. As a Cygnar player... Well, as a Cygnar player, I'd drop eCaine and Taryn and shoot eDoomy to pieces on turn 2. So there is that. Without that though, I'd be pretty concerned.

Testament of Menoth
*Reckoner
Errants (Red)
Errants (White)
Errants (Black)
Choir
Vassal
Paladin
Paladin
Dartan
Vessel of Judgement
Choir Mechanics
Daughters of the Flame, or something like that.

We rolled off, I won, elected to go first, and he chose a side. I deployed my thirteen models with the big stuff in front, little stuff (Medium bases, heh) in the back.

His Errants spread out, with the Vessel to my left, and daughters way to the left. I don't have a picture of deployment, or even my first turn, so you'll have to imagine all of the running that happened, otay?

Mt. King ran up, Mulg ran, Earthborn put is animus down on Mulg, eDoomy put it on the King, Refuge on the Earthborn, and Wild Aggression on the king also. The rest went to the stone. Everything else ran, and the Bragg's did a 4+ tough and hid behind the king.

Menoth all ran as well. Ashen Veil landed on the foremost unit of Errants, and Hallowed Avenger went to the Reckoner, which is a neat trick. He keeps his jack far enough back that he'll never reach, but the jack has Assault, so as long as he gets 3'', he gets a shot off. The cav went left some more for a wide flanking action.



So there's actually a scenario in play, and I actually want to try winning on scenario. I kind of have a list that does it very well, that's able to just tank damage and dish it back out, but I don't really want to give him a leg up on the competition by leaving the zone uncontested. In the end, I decide it's feat turn.

Doomshaper upkeeps Refuge and WA. The Earthborn moves up and animuses Mulg. Doomshaper moves up, feats, gets the Earthborn Animus onto Mt. King, reloads the stone, and hangs out. Mulg charges in, smacks a daughter that got too close, goads back to the other, kills her too, and goads closer to Doomy.

The King charges. I'm hoping I can kill a decent amount, but they're spread out pretty well, so there's only maybe three Errants in melee range. Happily, the King has Killshot, and I tell you what, a RNG10 POW16 spray is a thing of beauty. He pulverizes the first Errant, and happily sprays the paladins all lined up for him. Unfortunatly, I miss Dartan, and another Paladin, but manage to kill one, an errant, and something else. Choir or something. I buy a few more attacks to smack what's left of the Errants in melee, and hang out. The Reckoner takes one of those chances to charge/assault, but has blocked himself in enough that he doesn't get the 3''.

The ksb shuffles up to catch both the King and the brick in aura, putting the King at a healthy ARM23, and the sons of Bragg hang out in the brick.



Now we've forced an issue. My opponent pretty much has to kill the Mt. King this turn. I've forced him down his throat, and he's got to kill it, all the way, because the King's going to drop enough whelps to heal back, and, once he's killed everything in melee with a sweep, he's going to snack and heal back to nearly full health. He has one chance to kill this guy, so he gets after it.

I think I'm ok though. The positioning I've got means he can really only get so many Errants into melee with me, and the first unit that gets into melee with me is going to spawn whelps that I can use to block chargelanes.

The testament drops Hallowed Avenger, teleports with a soul he gained (Something he does), feats, giving his entire army except the Daughters (out of control) incorporeal.

Great.

So they can charge through eachother. This makes things considerably more difficult for me. The first unit tears into the King, only doing minor cuts and scrapes until one dude cranks the damage roll and nails the king for 13 damage.

I spawn a bunch of whelps all over, mostly in front to block charges. The next unit of Errants charges, not getting a lot of attacks on the king, but most killing whelps. The third unit charges, does very little, mostly running and killing whelps. They do run to engage my brick, and one gets a swing at Tor, but fails to hit. DEF13 yo.

Then the Reckoner, who my opponent has carefully left a hole for, (it has reach too, so that helps) charges in, and over the course of a few attacks, manages to eliminate an aspect. I'm doing pretty good.

A paladin charges, and singlehandedly does 11 damage. I drop a whelp to block the last paladin, but something kills it, and Dartan charges in and with a 14 damage roll, just barely kills the King.

Crap.

The Vessel of Judgement fires at the EBDT and the leaps kill a KSB dude or two, and the Daughters reposition.

So, that plan did not work. At all. Was rather disappointing. I was really hoping that the King would tank that better (ARM23, yo) but no dice. Well, lots of dice. Anyways. I forgot to take a picture, in the midst of my grief even. That bad.

Now we're in trouble. Doomy drops Wild Aggression, upkeeps Refuge, and the game goes on.

There's not a lot I can do. Tor Assaults the Paladins in a revenge scheme, and really fails to kill many of them, if any. I annihilate several Errants, but that's it. Wrathar whacks another one, and I think the two-sword dude growls angrily. Everyone else moves up, does the Earthborn animus shuffle, Janissa drops a wall (Which I've neglected to mention so far, but yeah, it's been happening) But I am contesting now. eDoomy primal shocks something too, maybe another Paladin, but I don't think it connects.



Now everything engages. The Vessel, which has been doing miracles and such throughout the game, has been faithfully repaired to perfect by the mechanics, takes a shot at the EBDT, and fries a another KSB or two, including the stone, which toughs. The Daughters charge in, attacking Mulg and EBDT, and do some damage, not a lot, but enough to spawn whelps. That's great, because I was running hot on fury. No more!

The Errants charge, but they can't do much with a wall in the way, so mainly, they engage things, and the guys with Ashen Veil are up front. Two of them get close to the KSB but that's it.

The Reckoner moves, shoots EBDT for some damage, but not a lot.

The Paladins get in there and do their stance for no attacks unless they're magic, which means that only eDoomy can swing at them.

"Yeah, the old troll with a stick, he can hit us. That's cool. No Mulg, bad Mulg. You can't hurt me. Just yoda over there."

Annoying.






I'm beginning to feel a little bit better about this game. He's running out of things that can kill my beasts at their wonderful ARM21-22. Between snacking and regeneration, they're doing decent.

I've got two whelps left. Mulg eats one and dumps his fury, and the EDBT eats one to heal. Doomy drops Refuge, upkeeps Wild Agression on Mulg (Forgot to mention that I think) and away we go.

The wall drops away, and Wrathar takes a swing at an errant. Tor assaults past the pillar to try and tie up the reckoner, but targets an errant and sprays all the way back into the Choir, killing a few. Wrathar kills his dude too, so that's cool.

The EBDT goes ballistic and starts killing Errants and daughters, goading along, and snacking like crazy. He kills two or three models, goads back to in front of Doomy and hangs out. Mulg moves in, kills whats left and sits next to the EBDT. Doomy moves over, primal shocks a Paladin (Hah!) and hides behind the two beasts. Janissa steps back, drops a wall to the right to prevent a charge from the Errants or Reckoner, and the stone gets up and moves, popping whats left of his aura while the last ksb foot dude whacks an errant hilariously, doing absolutely nothing.



This becoming a pretty serious grind. No points for anyone, except my opponent who has two because he killed my objective at some point, and scored a point in the zone after killing the King. But he still can't do much against my brick. Testament teleports around and hides behind his objective. The vessel shoots the EBDT, gets decent bounces and boosts damage on the one that hits Janissa, and kills her. That's no good.

The Errants try to kill Tor and the KSB, but only fail in killing the KSB. Three or four missed melee attacks are what keeps Tor alive. The Reckoner walks in and finishes him though. And that's turn.



With Janissa gone, my chances are looking slimmer by the minute. The Reckoner is still out there and pretty healthy, and I lost the best thing keeping the Errants back. So it's time to go. I've got two options.

Wrathar can kill a dude nearby in the way, and Doomy can use his powerful attack and whack the dude in front of the EBDT, cast Refuge on him, and call it a day. Maybe primal shock because it'd help. Then the EBDT charges the Vessel, kills it, refuges back, and Mulg uses the cleared charge lane to charge/goad to the Testament and kill him.

OR

Wrathar and Doomy kill the same dudes, EBDT tramples across (he's in the way of mulg's chargelane if he just stops in front of the vessel) to behind the Vessel and kills it from there, then Mulg charges.

So we begin. Wrathar smashes a dude, and Doomy misses... Buy... boost, kill him, cast Refuge, done. EBDT charges in, can't quite get a POW bonus from Wrathar or anyone really, and then proceeds to miss his charge attack, and to whuff his damage rolls from thereon out, leaving the Vessel at four or five boxes...

He refuges back, Mulg's charge lane is still busy, so he moves around to the other side of Doomy and gets ready for the Reckoner assault.



Lo and behold, the Reckoner gets full focus, and assaults, killing Mulg quite easily. No wall and no animus from the EBDT hurts. The few remaining Errants charge the EBDT, and kill him as well. The problem with Errants is the first three or four aren't hard to kill, but for every one killed, they gain +1 ARM/STR, and the last one or two are little light warjacks of their own. So the four or five left easily smashed an ARM18 beast that was already somewhat damaged.

In the midst of that, my KSB dude is dead too. It's literally just Doomy. So the last Paladin, maybe even Dartan, charges and murders him.

Except he toughs. Haha.






Doomy stands up, boosts to hit and kills the Paladin in a last act of revenge.

Back to my opponent's turn, the Reckoner gets fully loaded, walks over, boosts to hit, and pummels him into the ground.

And he toughs!

Buy. Boost. Stomp on yoda again.

No tough.



Thoughts on the game.

1. That was a lot of fun. I really thought I was in trouble after losing the Mt. King, but I actually weathered really well until I lost Janissa. I also had a serious chance of assassination. My opponent and I talked about it before I took off, and he actually suggested the route I took, and the EBDT threw the game away with a failed charge on a DEF10 object... That was the pretty critical point of that turn, second critical point of the game for me (the first being the death of the mt. king), and he just blew it.

2. That list weathered against the Menoth list pretty well. For being an ARM-cracking list as he described it, my EBDT/Mulg duo held on for a long time. Between snacking and regen, those guys are boss.

3. Losing the Mt. King hurt. That game would have been over if the King had survived. Whelps would have been eaten, he would have swept, which would have all been boosted thanks to Iron Agression. He'd of killed the Reckoner. The Killshot would have fried a lot of things, and then the EBDT and Mulg could just push forward and kill what was left. The Mt. King dieing was painful. And fairly unexpected. The feat helped him a lot just with positioning. The only things with reach were his paladins and Reckoner, and I could block charge lanes all day with whelps. The incorporeal aspect of the feat let him charge through his units, and get lanes in spite of everything. The feat helped him a lot. Which is the point of feats, I suppose, but it was legitimately perfect in this situation. On top of that, those three damage rolls were what he needed. He had a charge left from a daughter and a shot from the vessel, and both would have been minor cuts. But the three powerhouse strikes... Those were nuts. Still, I'm not sure what I would have done. I probably should have held back for another turn, but I didn't want to give him CPs. I ended up letting him have them anyways, but at the time, it seemed like a bad idea. I wish I had held him back just a turn, but even then, he'd of got the alpha on the king, and I would have had the same problem. We both agreed I made the right decision, but it simply didn't work out.

4. My list. Most people take maybe an Axer, or more KSBs, or something instead of the Sons of Bragg, but I really wanted the Sons for clearing up jamming lines, which they did quite well. I haven't decided if I'll keep them or not, but I do like them in this list. I just don't know if there's something that would serve me better.

5. Overall, this was a really fun game, and hinged on some pivotal moments. My opponent played awesome, and I made mistakes. It was a fun game and really enjoyed it. Probably my favorite loss.

Comments, questions, insults, suggestions, bring it.


@Vangeleon. Yeah lol, that second part took awhile to write.

50pts eCaine (Cygnar) vs. eMadrak (Trollbloods)

eMadrak's back, and I've dropped the Long Riders. I like them, but my new additions are the Champion Hero and Bonehammer, the UA. Seems like fun, so we ran with it. My opponent dropped eCaine, and again, I brought eMadrak, because... I bring eMadrak to everything?

eCaine
*Squire (which he forgot)
*Rowdy
Rangers
ATGM w/UA
Boomhowlers
Forgeguard
Ayaina and Holt
Alexia and the Risen
JR

eMadrak
*Bomber
*Impaler
Runebearer
Janissa
Fell Caller
Fennblades w/UA
Fennblade Kithkar
Champions w/UA
Champion Hero
KSB w/ UA

We rolled off, he won and elected to take first. I took the side of the map with less forest and a wall. He deployed, spreading his stuff out quite a bit. ATGM went on my right, Forgeguard center with Caine and Rowdy, Risen to the left. Boomies got spread all across the front.

I set up with Fenns across from ATGM, the Champions across from the Risen, and the Madrak/Warbeast/KSB brick in the middle.

AD'd Rangers set up with the Risen to help against the Champions, and we set off.



Most stuff moved up. Caine got Blur onto the ATGM, spreading them out as much as he could from the Bomber. Heightened Reflexes went on the Boomies. JR put AS on Rowdy and hung back. Rangers hung out in the woods, Risen pushed up on the flank, Boomies ran forward, and the Forgeguard chugged behind them. Rowdy pushed forward, A+H stealth and that was that.



My list does what it normally does. Everything pushes forward. Madrak dumps everything to the stone, KSB pops an aura, and everything stays as close to the KSB as possible. Everything but 3 fenns on the far right. Between Defensive Line and the KSB, Champions are ARM20. It's pretty legit. Even most of the Fenns are ARM16.



Caine upkeeps Heightened Reflexes, but drops Blur. The Boomhowlers run and engage the Fenns, but don't do anything else other than their fell call. The ATGM spread out, the Risen push up on the left some more, and the Rangers shift around. The Forgeguard group up, waiting for the chance to countercharge, and everything else fills gaps.






I really dislike it when my Fenns are engaged, but I don't get Vengeance. Dirtbags. Anyways. I made a few mistakes. I should have countercharged with Bonehammer, but I didn't, not wanting him to get outside of the KSB aura. Looking back, he would have been at least ARM18, and eCaine was too far back to make a dent in him. So instead, the Hero charges (He grants tactictian to Champions) and threshers (which is pretty legit), killing 3 boomies, all three of whom fail to tough.

Madrak moves up, smacks a dude who toughs, and buys an attack. Then he hits another and spends the fury from that kill to back away and spends 2 fury to put farstrike on the bomber. The Champions move up to kill the few they can engage. The Kithkar moves forward over the wall and kills two Boomies on the right flank, and both of them fail to tough as well. Lots of threes so far.

The Impaler moves up and chucks a spear into Boomhowler, and does three damage. The Bomber moves through the opening the Impaler left by moving forward, gets onto the hill and puts 2 AOE4s downrange, but only kills 2 Risen.

The fell caller moves up and puts War Cry on the Fenns, who minifeat and charge forward. One engages both Forgeguard and Rangers, another gets after Boomy and two more engage the ATGM. The ATGM pass CMD, but the Boomhowlers fail, and so do the Rangers. The dwarves, unfortunately, do not. However, the Fenns kill everything they charge, which ammounts to all of the boomies except Boomhowler himself, one ATGM and one Dwarf.



Not a bad turn. Caine upkeeps HR again, and the Risen run forward, pressing the left flank. Ayaina and Holt move up, and Ayaina kisses the Fenns, followed by Holt killing 2 of them. The ATGM move up, and start killing Fenns to, and between them, and Caine who pushes up onto the hill, they kill all but the UA and drummer. The Forgeguard move up a bit, Rowdy presses forward, the Rangers fail CMD again, Boomhowler passes, and it's a done deal.



So, the Bomber leads off, and puts 2 shots into the Risen and Alexia. I kill most of the Risen, leaving 2. The Champions charge forward and kill half of the Forgeguard, and put a few dents into Rowdy. The Kithkar charges onto the hill and swings at Caine twice, needing 10s and misses. Then eMadrak goes, and I completely screw up my turn. I fully meant to put Blood Fury on him with the Runebearer, and War Cry for +2 MAT from the Fell Caller, and I forgot to do both. He charges Boomy, kills him, feats, and threshers the other two, missing one and plastering the other. The Kithkar swings at Caine again, misses, and the Champions kill anything they can reach, except Rowdy, who they put a few points on, but nothing more. The Bomber throws another bomb, but it deviates uselessly.

Madrak, on the other hand, uses the fury gained to move up, and proceeds to Tide of Death his way into Caine where he lands finally with four fury. He buys, boosts to hit needing 9s, and misses. Buys, boosts to hit with his last attack, and does a whopping 4 damage...

So that was dumb. Completely butchered that. My options look pretty bad now, but I might can run the KSBs far enough to give Madrak some Grim Salvation targets. Speaking of which, I still have 2 fenns. So the Fell caller moves up, war crys them, and they charge forward. The UA needs an 8 to hit, and connects with eCaine, and on 3 dice, rolls exactly what he needs to kill Caine.



Thoughts:

1. I got stupid lucky on the end there. I completely had that game, and didn't put anything on my caster that I wanted to. Secondly, I could have put Blood Fury on the Fenns with the Runebearer, and I didn't think about doing that either. I had that game, but I screwed it up and just barely pulled it off.

2. That eCaine list was weird... FG are good on Caine I guess (Haven't tried it.), and Boomies are gold, but no Reinholdt, no Gate Crashing, Caine did very little work, the Risen didn't screen at all, the Rangers never fired, and the Boomies never got to attack. I think I would have screened with the Boomies to block as much of the Fenn's charge as possible to prevent failed CMD checks. Granted his toughchecks still sucked, but he still didn't screen that great. He could have at least shot with the boomies, (Rangers yo, that's what they're for), but that didn't happen either. The Risen could have screened as well, and they didn't do that either.

Overall, good game, but I pulled off a lucky game win there at the end. Thoughts, comments, questions, thinly veiled insults from PGs who know what I should have done instead, all welcome.

50pts Reznik2 (Menoth) vs. eDoomshaper (Trollbloods)

My opponent from the previous game was up for another one, as long as I was cool with a lot of proxying. The main proxys are pretty simple. One base is a second Vessel of Judgement, and the other with Reznik1 on it, is actually Reznik2.

I've never fought Reznik2, and I've only briefly read through his page. I figured when Vengeance came out that as rarely as I fight Khador, I wouldn't have to deal with him unless Sevensins decides to bring him in some janky list. So I speedread and headed straight for the storyline. I already own everything Cygnar spoiled except Stryker3 (I like my 60$, thanks).

So, my first thought was to play pGrim, since I'd already dropped eMadrak, but I reaally have been itching to buy the other caster that I got into the faction for, that being eDoomy (Though Jarl is close behind). So I went and got Kovnik Joe for my wife's new Winterguard Rifle unit, and eDoomy. If you can see the little headless, armless troll teetering on the base amidst the KSB, that's eDoomy.

I really like him on the card, and the few times I've vassaled him, I've really liked him. He's basically Cygnar's Kraye without the cav rules. +3 SPD on the charge, charges and power attacks are free. Legit, right? On top of that, he has Wild Aggression (boosted melee and free charge) so that I get basically Kraye's feat, EVERY TURN. YEAH.

The other thing is I really want to play the Mt. King, and with Wild Aggression and feat, eDoomy makes that happen. Unfortunately, I didn't have the King with me today, so I settled for other things, like Mulg.

Oh, shucks.

Reznik2
*Sanctifier
Vessel of Judgement
Vessel of Judgement
Vassal Mechanics x2
Max Bastions
Max Bastions
Min Cinerators (They look mysteriously like Trollkin Champions)
Wracks
Wracks (proxied for a brief second by various trollkin)

This is a Tier list for Reznik, so he can have as many wracks as he wants, pull as much focus as he wants on turn 1. Also, tier bonuses give his infantry, or bastions and cinerators at least, advanced move, which is nice for SPD4 infantry.

My list was:

eDoomy
*Mulg
*Earthborn
*Axer
Janissa
KSB w/ Elder
Fenns w/ UA
Sons of Bragg
Fell Caller

I won the rolloff, elected to go second. He deployed everything, and there's not much you can do, really. Infantry, and then three huge based models in the back. Done.

I put my Fenns to the right, beasts to the left, KSBs behind me with the Sons for a second wave and we started. I didn't get the deployment pic, but you're not missing anything.

Advanced move is nice. One focus to the jack, then everything moves up, then actually activates and "runs" 8''. Reznik pushes forward, casts Death March (+2 MAT and Vengeance) on the Bastions to the right, and casts Creator's Wrath on himself (Much better stats, upkeepable), and Iron Aggression on the warjack, after pulling 3 from my trollkin wracks, all of which conveniently blow up. Sanctifier runs up, and it goes to me.



Same thing. The Fenns run. Mulg runs, the Earthborn sprints to support the Fenns, the Axer moves up. Doomshaper puts Iron Aggression on Mulg, and Refuge on the Axer, then puts 2 to the stone. Stone pops aura, says no continuous affects, and moves up. Janissa drops a wall, Sons of Bragg filter in behind.



Reznik upkeeps all of his spells, pulls another focus from the Rack. The Vessels take shots as they move up, but nothing's in range of the right one. The left one hits Tor, forces him to tough (which he passes), and fails to damage Mulg (awww) and the other two Sons of Bragg. His infantry all run and engage my Fenns as best they can, pretty much neutering my charge with them. Reznik then gets brave, and moves up. First, he toes foward to juuust catch eDoomy in his control range, and casts Lamentation, which is pretty annoying for me, since it doubles all fury casting costs. So, my beasts can force like normal, but animus cost double, upkeeping costs double, so on, so forth. It's a solid spell.

He also gets brave and tries to drift "The Flesh is Weak" onto Mulg and my Sons of Bragg, which would prevent them from charging, running or special attacks this turn. He tosses it out, and it drifts back onto his own guys, doing nothing except leaving him at one focus, waaaaaay back behind his own lines.



By Waaaaaaaay back I mean almost exactly 14'' from eDoomy, and I know because he cast Lamentation. My stuff's tied up, I didn't get any Vengeance, and if you're aware of what Bastions do, let me educate you. They're a low-def decent-ARM 8 box medium based model that has the ability when it takes damage to spread it out over the whole unit. You can take 12 damage, and spread 6 of it to the dude in the back, and 5 of it to the dude on the right, and take one yourself. Battlecollege claims the unit can take 35pts of damage before one of them is killed.

That's a lot of work to clear these dudes out. They're spread out too, so I can't just walk the Earthborn up, apply 35pts of damage to one dude so they're all on one box, he might just kill that dude, and take all of it himself, and the other four would be out of reach. It's tough to deal with. I have 0 faith being able to attrition this list with what I have. eMadrak might could have done better, but Idk. pGrim with a lot of shooting, maybe. But nonetheless, I see a small glimmer of hope.

Reznik is 14'' from eDoomy, who is 1'' behind Mulg. Mulg is SPD4. Add 3 for the charge, 2 for reach, and we're at 9''. But factor in the Axer's Rush animus, and Doomy's feat, and now we're at 14'', which is plenty. On top of that, Doomy can Goad his beasts, so technically, I could kill a dude, move an inch, and kill another one, and just go until I'm out of fury on him.

Between Mulg and Reznik are 2 Bastions and a load of free strikes. Mulg can handle a few, but I still want to mitigate them. I do, however, need to clear those two dudes. At the very least, I need to clear the first one, but again, I have to essentially kill a heavy warjack's amount of boxes in order to do this.

So first off, I screw up and drop both upkeeps because I don't want to pay 4 fury to upkeep them. I reality, I should have dropped Refuge, and left Wild Aggression up since Doomy can upkeep one for free. But no. So we pull in fury back to full, and activate Doomy. I measure back (believe it or not, there's a scenario in play, and it's killbox), and Doomy is just two hairs inside killbox, but only 1 hair in Reznik's control. So we creep back, stay in the box, but get out of control of Reznik. Then Doomy feats, puts Wild Aggression on Mulg, and the Rush animus as well. He keeps the last two fury for transfers, but I really don't expect to survive the next turn regardless.

Now I have to clear things. The Axer starts first, and walks (Doomy's +3 SPD from feat isn't dependant on a charge.) 8'', and threshers, catching a few fenns and a Bastion, and a Cinerator. He murders the Cinerator, kills the fenns, who fail tough, and boosts damage on the Bastion, and puts a respectable amount on him, which he spreads throughout the rest of them. Then the Axer goads forward, and hits the one further back, boosting damage on him as well. Another decent roll for damage, and six, seven boxes get spread out.

The Fell caller gives the Fenns +2 to melee attacks, moves up, and sprays two Bastions, doing three or four boxes each. The Fenns then charge, and finally kill the nearest one (not in the path of Mulg, but ok), and kill a Cinerator as well, while putting damage into the second unit of Bastions as well.

So then the Sons of Bragg charge/assault, after Reveille. I wanted fervor, but with Tor knocked down, that wouldn't work, I needed his spray. Tor hits at an angle, and sprays across, catching three Bastions and a vassal mechanic in the back. He misses the center Bastion, but deals solid damage again to the other two, and kills the mechanic. His melee attack connects, damage gets spread out, and then Wrathar just murders the dude, cranking the damage and my opponent doesn't want to spread that out, and kills the Bastion.

At this point, Mulg can probably charge relatively safely to the last Bastion, and goad into Reznik, but I've got one more trick. The Earthborn walks up, and easily grabs the last Cinerator, and pitches him across the board into the Bastion, kding them both, and cranking the damage roll on that one as well, killing the Bastion, since the remaining unit is surviving one one or two boxes.

Mulg charges. I take a free strike from a bastion, but he rolls trip ones and a 3. It would have taken a pretty serious hit to cut him down, but that was unfortunately pathetic for a Bastion.

Mulg hits Reznik, and drops him to about seven boxes. The second attack whuffs it and takes him to two, but the third attack finishes him.



Thoughts:

1. I got lucky with some damage rolls on that. If the Bastions had held on a little longer, I'd of been in trouble. I also got lucky on their placement. If there'd of been one more in my way, I might have had problems.
2. Looking back, Assassination by Mulg may not have been my only choice, because Primal Shock is pretty solid with eDoomy as well, but under Lamentation and kill box, that was going to be difficult.
3. Outside of assassination, I did have Goad, and I forgot that. The Axer and the Earthborn could have cleared some swathes, and for that matter, so could have Mulg. I don't think I could have cut down enough of them to not get counterstriked hard though, and once I lose Mulg and the Earthborn, I'd be in serious trouble without a way to kill Reznik. It would have been an attrition battle starting from the back foot, and I think I would have lost, but I don't know that it was as hopeless as I made it out to be. Still, I really wanted to see what Mulg could do. I got into trollbloods and eDoomy so I could sling that monster around the map, so I was really excited to do that.

Comments, questions, insults, go for it. Hope you enjoyed the (short) batrep.

50pts Reznik (Menoth) vs. eMadrak (Trollbloods)

Saturday, I was lucky enough to land two games against Menoth. I don't get to play Menoth very often, so I had no idea what to bring, except Pyres. The problem is that I never bring Pyre Trolls, so I didn't want to metagame. My lists, therefore, stayed pretty much the same. My opponent brought Reznik1 out, and I dropped eMadrak, because... that's what I do.

Incidentally, when you see Reznik, it's not the original model, it's been modified, and actually legitimate, not the miniature armored dude the regular model consists of. It looks good. In fact, my opponents whole army looked legit. Anyways, as I said, I rarely play against Menoth so Reznik is new to me.

His feat isn't bad though. Strips all fury/focus points, applies fire to someone who casts spells (E.G., Runeshapers, TAC, etc), and doesn't allow focus allocation. Against me, it will strip the fury off of my beasts, I'll lose my upkeeps, and I'll have to cut my caster for fury. Not a big deal. In fact, in the right circumstances, him taking all the fury off my beasts is kinda cool. I imagine all of these full-blooded dire trolls charging around and then Reznik reads his stuff, and suddenly, they're less mad I guess? The other neat thing he does is when he kills a model, he creates a wrack right there.

His spells are Engine of Destruction, which boosts his SPD, STR and MAT for a round. Ignite, +2 damage and crit fire. Hex blast, a ranged AOE that clears upkeeps from a unit. Iron Aggression, boosted melee and free charges for warjacks. Perdition, a ranged attack that if it damages a model, a warjack may make a full advance.

Cool. I won the rolloff, and he elected the side of the map he wanted. We actually did a scenario, but if you've read any of my batreps yet, you know that 9 times out of 10, I completely ignore the scenario. It's not that I'm trying to, but in the case of this scenario, we have 2 melee monster casters smashing into the middle ground. By the time either of us gets close enough to dominate, the other has charge range. It's that simple.

Our lists were the following:

Reznik1
*Avatar of Menoth
*Reckoner
Choir
Maddie Corbeau
Vessel of Judgement
Vassal Mechanichs x2
Knights Exemplar
Knights Exemplar
Knights Exemplar
Wracks
Dartan Vilmont
Vassal of Menoth

I think that's right. I don't have Menoth on my Warroom yet to add up the cost, but I think that's it.

eMadrak
*Runebearer
*Impaler
*Slag Troll
*Axer
Fennblades w/UA
Long Riders
Sons of Bragg
Krielstone Bearer w/UA
Janissa
Fenn Kithkar

So, first off, I made a huge mistake not bringing the Chronicler, or the Fell Caller. I realized I didn't have room for it with the Long Riders. I think in the future, I'll be dropping the Sons of Bragg because A) They're a Character unit, and B) don't particularly need Madrak's help to be good, and C) They're in my pGrim list too.

Secondly, I really like the Storm Troll I normally have in this list, but I had a point extra so I took the Axer for feat. He did ok, but I missed my Storm troll. However, when I get Horthol, he'll replace the Stormtroll entirely, so there's that.

Thirdly, I found out that Janissa is not a small-based character. When I got her used, she was already glued to a small base, so I just assumed that since she was a petite as trolls can get, she got a small base. It was really nice too because she could be right near madrak (outside of grim salvation), and not block line of sight to him. No more. But I'm glad someone pointed it out.

So, we deployed. I put Fenns on the right, Long riders on the left and beasts right down the middle. Sons of Bragg go in the back as a second line, end-game piece, and an awesome unit at clear up jams for my Fenns.

He put his jacks to my left, and Exemplars everywhere. Remember, there's three units, so he puts one to the left, and one to the right, then carefully mixes the third one up in the middle, setting them up within the other units so everything's in CMD, but so I can't really kill a whole unit in a turn. The Vessel goes on my right to cause pain for my Fenns, and support most of the Exemplars. Apparently, the Vessel can martyr or something, a model that dies in it's CMD, and cause it to hit back before it dies. Which is legit. It's like immediate Vengeance. He also places his wracks, spreading them out all over the place.


I lead off. I do some math on the Vessel of Judgement (which has a ranged attack) and go forward with it. Moses puts Harmonious Exaltation on Madrak for a cheaper spell. The beasts run forward, riling up to 5 fury between the 3 of them. Madrak puts Blood Fury down on the Fenns for 1, dumps the rest to the stone, and moves up, KSB moves up with him, pops aura, and for a change, tells Menoth NO to fire and stuff. Felt good. Janissa moves up and completes the kodiak moment with a wall.

The Long Riders run, and the Fenns run. They're DEF10 now with Blood fury, but I'm hoping I mathed well enough to keep them safe from the Vessel for a turn. It's got a RNG12 shot that essentially electro leaps d3 times to the nearest models. Not like chain lightning, which is... you know, a chain, but all 1-3 strikes originate from the first target. The More you Know.

The Sons of Bragg move up, and I believe that's it. Oh, the Kithkar runs up behind the Fenns.



In reply, the horde of Exemplars runs forward. Remember now, there's three units. marked by red, white and black skirts (ha), and the red ones get Ignite from Reznik as he moves up. The Exemplars are neat because for each one that dies, it adds +1STR and ARM to the survivors. There's like, six in a unit? The last guy is basically a light warbeast. They're a pain. Not so much as the dudes with self-sacrifice, but still a pain.

Reznik is still activated, and he puts Iron Aggression on the Reckoner (I believe), and camps. The Avatar generates a whopping 4 focus (turn 1...) and runs. There's an upkeep token next to him, so I feel like he gazed, but I'm not sure if he can gaze and run at the same time, so it might not be gaze.

The reckoner assaults forward, misses a Long Rider, and the Choir shuffles up and says I can't shoot their jacks. My Slag troll's shoulders visibly sag.



But wait! There's a huge based model nearby that's not living! The giant portable organ is apparently not living, so the Slag's good to go. Madrak pulls in his fury, upkeeps Blood Fury on the Fenns. The Impaler moves up, far strikes the Slag, and pitches a spear at someone but misses. The Slag walks up, throws at the Vessel, ends up hitting twice, boosting damage, and taking the Vessel down to like, 5 boxes. Not bad.

The Fenns Minifeat and charge, and apparently the Exemplars are all fearless, which is cool, but my Fenns still pretty much tear them apart. I don't manage to kill all of one unit, but I kill a good chunk of two of them. My favorite was the far right Fenn that killed the Wrack, and got 2 more Exemplars because of it blowing up. And my Fenn lived. Ha. However, because of the Vessel of Judgement, two exemplars martyr, and kill 2 fenns who fail tough before the exemplars themselves die.

The Long riders shuffle across, and one charges the Avatar, doing 8pts of Damage and tieing them up for a bit. Sons of Bragg press forward, and Madrak walks up, drops Warpath, camps 2. The KSB moves up, pops aura, no continuous effects, and Janissa pops the wall again.






Not a bad turn. The counter strike is coming though. Reznik upkeeps both spells, and the Avatar generates 2 focus. My opponent starts by measuring control, but he's outside of 12'' for the assassination with Maddie. So, an Exemplar uses it to move up, and the Vessel moves up and shoots my Kithkar, boosts (by 'cutting' itself) and kills the fenn UA, but only just fails to get the Kithkar. The Exemplars counter attack, and takes the Fenns population down to about 5, including the drummer.

Incidentally! Did you know the Drummer has takeup? So I could park the guy next to Madrak, and when he grim salvations, another Fenn can run to take his place if he's within 3''. Pretty stupid. Madrak can never die. "Camp Fury? What for!?" he announces loudly to all of his nervous friends nearby.

The other Exemplar unit moves up in a charge run and tie up one Longrider, and kill the one engaging the Avatar. The Avatar then walks up, and gazes. The Reckoner assaults forward again, and kills a Long Rider. Then a Vassal gives him another shot, and he shoots my Long Rider leader, but he toughs. First Tough of the game.

Dartan runs up and does Stone and Mortar, stance, I think, creeping up on my flank. Reznik moves up, camps focus.



I think really hard about assassination this turn with Madrak. I suspect I can tide of death up to the caster, but it doesn't seem like it'll work so I go a different route. The Fenns kill a few Exemplars, which in turn kill them back because of the Vessel. One of them even finishes the Kithkar.

I drop Blood Fury, and Warpath both. The Long Riders want to charge lots of things, but the Avatar of Menoth says no. So the Slag lobs rocks at it, takes it down pretty respectably, but not quite enough.

Moses exalts Madrak, and Madrak walks up, puts Blood Fury on the Long Riders, and puts a fury to the stone, camping 2. Everyone else does the normal truffle shuffle, e.g. KSB moves, stations around Madrak, camps, and Janissa walls up.

The Long Riders go ahead and charge the Avatar and kill it, with ease. The Sons Assault forward, or really, just Tor, who sprays Dartan and cranks the damage rolls with Fervor, killing the noble paladin, my favorite dude in Menoth (granted, the rest of the faction sets such a low bar).

What I should have done is kill the Avatar with the sons of Bragg, and charge the Long Riders into other stuff, but I didn't. My PG pointed out that I could have put 3 or 4 ranged attacks into Reznik this turn with feat (Two thrown axes and 2 spears from the Impaler,), and finished him off with a Long Rider charge, but that didn't occur to me. Should have, it didn't. Once I figured out I couldn't Tide of Death around the place, I didn't want to assassinate anymore.

The axer, which incidentally, has done 0 this game, moves up into the zone and gets ready for late game carnage. The Storm troll would have been better for this list. Even Horthol... Or hey! Fell Caller and Chronicler, but no.

The Fenns charge, one getting into the Vessel of Judgement, and ending it's sad existence. The rest work on killing more Exemplars, which are now getting pretty ridiculous as far as ARM and STR. Little 1pt paladins all over the place. Not sure how that works. I assume they just put on all the armor their buddies had, and use their steroids too.

The Impaler moves over to protect Madrak from a direct charge and throws at something insignificant. Should have tried to crit smite the Reckoner, but I didn't. I've got 2 fury on Madrak, but I don't want to go over too much, even though I'm pretty sure Reznik is feating this turn.



Reznik is in trouble. He drops Iron Aggression since the Avatar is dead, and pulls a focus from his wrack which decides to esplode. Maddie lets him move up, but he really doesn't think he can get past the Impaler, AND kill Madrak enough times to get past like, 5 grim salvations. So he feats, and walks over to the wreck of the Avatar for cover. He kills a Long Rider, and wracks him up, then puts Iron Aggression on the Reckoner. The Exemplars move in and kill a few more Fenns, but they're both running low in numbers. One of them gets into the remaining Long Rider, the leader, and forces a tough check again, which he passes somehow.

The Reckoner assaults forward, and forces a Tough check on my Son of Bragg with reach, Wrathar. Then he whacks him, kills him, whacks Tor, and kills him too.



Now, I can assassinate. Fenns Vengeance around, I drop Blood Fury. The last Son of Bragg charges the Reckoner and does ok. The stones activate, move around. They lost all of their fury in the feat, so I have nothing left to pop, and I'm certainly not giving them any with Madrak. Madrak charges, and has plenty of distance to Reznik. He boosts to hit, hits, does solid damage. Buys, hits, buys, hits, and kills Reznik.



Thoughts on the game:

1. No Fell Callers and Chroniclers was dumb. I could have really screwed with some Errants if I'd had "Hero's Tragedy" (Enemy model is KD if it hits model in unit), and some +2 attack rolls would have been cool. Overall, I didn't miss them too much, but I very easily could have, and they most certainly would have done more work than my Axer did.

2. I had a solid assassination that I passed up. I didn't feel like I really needed to take it though. I was attritioning halfway decent, and my opponent had actually scored a point earlier when he killed an objective with an exemplar (forgot that) but I still felt like I was cutting down his forces well enough that I didn't need to worry about it too much. The reckoner might have been an issue, but if I hadn't felt confident on the assassination, I 1) wouldn't have gone for it and 2) would have moved the KDed longrider first to engage the Reckoner, getting another attack on him. Not enough to kill, but tie him up. Eventually it would have basically been Madrak vs. Reznik, but I still had an Axer left, a few Fenns (A force to be reckoned with on Blood Fury), and I still had a full unit of Kriel stones (Blood Fury makes them pretty decent too), Janissa (who has an AP attack, believe it or not), against Reznik, part of a Reckoner, a few Exemplars on the opposite side of the map from my Fenns, and Choir. I was doing decent, as long as I didnt' let Reznik kill me, which would have been difficult regardless.

3. I screwed on the assassination run, not getting Blood Fury onto Madrak with the Runebearer, that was dumb. Worked out, I had plenty to spare, because I could feat, kill the two Exemplars within reach of Madrak and get 2 more fury, plus another attack on Reznik and finish him off. Overall, it went fine, but I felt dumb for not getting blood fury.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed the game. I have one more, eReznik (The new Battle Engine Caster from Vengeance) vs. eDoomy. Comments, crits, all welcome.

50pts, Kallus (Legion) vs. pGrim (Trollbloods)

It was a busy weekend. Not quite tournament, but a lot of games. I had a second game with my Legion opponent from the batrep I posted Saturday morning, and I was fortunate enough to get 2 more games in later Saturday. There's a eMadrak vs. Reznik, and a proxy-heavy eDoomy vs. the new Menoth caster, Reznik2. We'll go chronologically though here. My legion opponent had another list he wanted to try, and that was Kallus. If you're unfamiliar with Kallus, it's because he's got a common Cryx problem. He's a decent caster in a faction of amazing ones. You rarely hear of Kallus when there is Lylyth2, Vayl1, Vayl2, Thag1 and Thag2, so on, so forth. No matter your playstyle, there's a legion caster that does it aggressively and competently. Kallus is also an infantry caster in a beast-heavy faction, a fight that the twins Rhyas and Saeryn have as well. The goal of these batreps aren't to brag about how good I did, or he did, but so that A) You can point out my mistakes and say hey, jedi, you suck at reading the rules, and B) You can learn about these two casters and when someone drops them on the board across from you, you're not completely clueless. I can count on one hand the times I've fought Harbinger, but thanks to Marx's batreps, I've kinda got a clue as to whats going on.

So, Kallus. He's also male, which I think is unique to him and Thagrosh in Legion... so there is that. For starters, he grants unyielding (+2 ARM for engaged models) to friendly models in his CMD. His four spells are Flashing Blade (Selective Thresher attack), Ignite (+2 Damage and crit fire), Eruption (POW14 AOE that stays in place) and Dark Guidance (Extra dice to attack rolls for faction models.). His feat grants +2 DEF to soulless models, and friendly warrior models killed in his control area become incubi. So, units hit accurately, with some decent damage, and expect a lot of bodies on feat turn. He tarpits crazy well.

Kallus
*Carnivean
*Scythean
Beast Mistress
*Shredder
*Shredder
*Shredder
*Shredder
Nyss Shepherd
Nyss Legionairres w/UA
Nyss Hex Hunters w/UA
Spawning Vessel

I dropped pGrim. I had no idea if that was a good idea or not, but I wanted to vary my casters up a bit. Jarl wouldn't have been bad for this list, but I felt like pGrim would be ok. My pGrim list is pretty janky though. See, I just got Mulg, and I really wanted to use him, I didn't even care if the list was functional, I just wanted him in there. So yeah. pGrim can do work too. One gun is RNG13 and adds +2 SPD for a beast charging the target hit, and the other gun is a RNG8 snare gun that KDs a target. His spells are great too. Cross Country gives Hunter and pathfinder to a unit/model. Marked for death removes incorporeal and stealth and drops DEF by 2. Lock the Target, if it damages the target, will prevent any running, charging, special attacks and all that on the model, and Return Fire is a cost 1 spell that lets a model fire if anything I have is targeted. I also realize I just got that wrong, and though the model the spell is on has to be targeted. That means... well, idk if it would have changed anything, I don't think he shot at me. But yeah. Good to know. Anyways. I really like the Earthborn on pGrim, but since I had Mulg, I reaaally wanted to use him instead. Besides, SPD4, +3 for Charge and +2 for Reach, plus another 2'' for Grim's rifle, and I can sling a SPD4 Beast out for a threat range of 11''. Add in Mulg being wounded and he's Relentless, adding in +2SPD to that. So yeah.

pGrim
*Mulg
*Bomber
*Impaler
Fennblades w/UA
Long Riders
Chronicler
Sons of Bragg

I won the rolloff, chose to go first. Fenns to one side, beasts to the other. My opponent matched me exactly and we set off.



First off, the beasts ran and generated fury up to 3. pGrim put Cross Country on the Long Riders, Return Fire on the Bomber and camped 3. The Fenns ran 12'', the Chronicler put "Tales of Mist" on them (concealment and can't be targeted while KD). Sons of Bragg move up and do +4 tough like the Boomhowlers. Long Riders sprinted for the woods.



Did you know that Hex Hunters are crazy fast? SPD7. I moved 12'' up the board and these losers sprint 14'' and tie me up. Crazy fast. And they didn't kill any fenns either. The least they could have done was give me Vengeance, but no.

The Legionairres move up and clump together, taking advantage of Defensive Line (+2 ARM B2B), and the Beast Mistress moves up and between her and her little army of miniature t-rexes, spams 8 Shredder animuses, Tenacity. +1DEF and ARM. Not bad. 11pt module, but seems neat.

The two beasts move up. Kallus moves up and gets Ignite on the Hex Hunters, in fact, I think he did that first.



No vengeance and my Fenns are tied up. Exactly what I didn't want. I really hoped I was far enough out of range of getting tied like that, but no. So I think about it for awhile, pull in fury and upkeep Cross Country. My Long Riders push farther into the woods, setting up for the flank attack next turn. Mulg walks up, and crunches a Hex Hunter engaging the far left Fenn.

The Impaler far strikes the bomber, and walks around Mulg. The Sons of Bragg move up, fervor (+2 to hit in melee and ranged, +2 damage), and Tor very carefully sprays the three Hex hunters engaging my next Fenn, kills all three, and the spray doesn't even touch my Fenn.

Then the Bomber shuffles forward, and chucks a bomb at the Hex Hunter UA, who is stealthed. Which is cool, I'm down with that. The blast deviates PERFECTLY back and to the left, and kills a couple of Hex Hunters, and leaves 1 box on the UA. Not bad. Bomber throws again, obviously misses because of Stealth, drifts AGAIN PERFECTLY back and to the right this time! Kills four hex hunters, leaving the UA and two in the front, all three promptly failing CMD.

Luck, dudes.

The Chronicler moves up and puts Hero's Tragedy on the fenns (If a warrior model hits, after the action is resolved, he's KD). The Fenns minifeat (Legionairres are Fearless I think so no worries there), and charge into the Swordsmen. Between the +1 DEF, +1 ARM on most of them, Unyielding, and Defensive line, these dudes are ARM20. I manage to kill 2 of them, and that's it, but still. Now my Tarpit is where I want them to be, and not vice versa.




So, the tarpit didn't work. My opponent is in damage control somewhat, but not too bad. The terms aren't his, but he's still doing ok, and my Fenns are going to struggle to do anything. He drops Ignite, and moves his Legionairres around, opening lanes and getting better positions. He doesn't want to kill a Fenn and get KD quite yet, but he'll take the Vengeance to shuffle.

The Carnivean starts off, and moves forward, spends a fury, and pushes the Scythean forward an inch, which I have never seen before. Kallus moves up, feats, and puts Ignite on the Scythean. He also casts Dark Guidance, which is an awesome spell. So now, the Scythean can't charge, run, anything, but he can move, and with Reach, has it. So he walks up, and I warn him. "Hey, Mulg has protective fit."

"Right, where he walks in and makes an attack."

"Yeah, everytime you hit."

"That's stupid."

So he changes his mind, and walks towards Mulg instead. He manages to kill Mulg, which is really sad, and has a bit to spare, so he swings at Grim, and I transfer to my Bomber, and kills it's spirit. And that's it for the Scythean.

The Legionairres charge, and three of them go after pGrim, hoping to finish him, but they're just out, by a hair's breadth, all three of them. The rest of them annihilate the Fenns that were engaging them, and then mini-feat with Iron Zeal, which stands them all back up and gives them +4 ARM, as if they needed it.

Also, the Spawning Vessel gets enough souls, and spawn ANOTHER shredder, and sends it careening into pGrim. Maybe that's what damaged the Bomber, I don't remember. But pGrim was pretty engaged at the end of the turn.



So now it's my turn. I lost Mulg, I'm losing Fenns, but I think I'm still ahead. However, I love assassinations, so I work through some pretty basic order of activation math. I have my Impaler, my Bomber, and maybe a few charge attacks with the Fenns, and I think I can kill Kallus, who's sitting on 2 transfers. I have easy access to Knockdown, I have my feat (-3DEF and SPD for enemy models in my Ctrl), so it's not too bad. Unhappily, my Bomber is engaged by one of the Legionairres that charged pGrim, and pGrim is engaged by a Scythean and Shredder. So, I pull in fury, cut for one or whatever I need, and upkeep Cross Country. The Long Riders charge, three of them at the Carnivean, and 2 at the Scythean, slamming him into the wall and knocking him down, leaving him on very little. The other three inflict mild damage to the Carnivean, but don't reach impact range, so no slam.

Happily though, pGrim is no longer engaged, by the Scythean, but I still have the Shredder, and I'd like the Scythean to be dead too. Tor assaults the Shredder, Wrathar with reach slips in behind him, and Rhudo runs over and makes faces at the Scythean who was out of his melee range. The Sons do Fervor again, and between Tor's spray, and the three attacks, murder the Shredder, freeing Grim finally.

Almost there. I debate about activating my Fenns first, but I go ahead and open with Grim. He spends 2 to farstrike himself, aims, feats, and I seriously debate about boosting. I need a 5. They say to boost if you absolutely need this to hit, but for a 5? If I had a fury left, I could far strike the Bomber, and which I really need to do sincethe Impaler doesn't have enough to farstrike them both. So, I finally get brave enough to roll it.

I get a 7.

KDs Kallus. He then spends a fury to heal the Spirit on the Bomber so that he can force him, and puts Farstrike on him. Now, with the Fenns, I want to charge, but he reminds me that Kallus has Unyielding, so I pass, and focus on the Legionairre engaging the Bomber instead, and manage to kill him, creating an incubi which I kill with another Fenn. Think that was the only incubi I created too lol.

The Impaler starts off, throws, connects, and does a crazy amount of damage. My opponent decides to keep it. I have 2 attacks left with the Bomber, and he has 2 transfers. Game over. I don't have much of a choice, but at the least, I might kill off the two beasts and keep Grim alive. So the bomber hits, boosts damage. POW16 is dice even, and Kallus transfers 15 or 16 damage to his Carnivean, leaving him at 5 boxes. The Scythean is at 4. I buy a second shot, hit, and boost damage again, and get another cranked damage roll. Easily enough to kill the Carnivean and Scythean both and have enough left over to polish off Kallus.



Thoughts on the game.

1. My dice were on fire, and not just damage rolls, but my deviations. Those bomber deviations were amazing, and perfect. I couldn't have aimed them better.
2. The list was a recommendation from another Legion player, who plays the Hex Hunters behind the Legionairres. I think this was the first time my opponent had tried this one, and I benefited from the unfamiliarity. The other way to do it is to tie the Legionaires into the front lines, and feat. Then, I struggle to kill them, when I do, I deal with Incubi. On his turn, he has left over legionairres, a bunch of Incubi, and a full unit of hex hunters with Battle mage. I suffer up to 4 waves of attacks, which is pretty brutal. Fenn Blades with Vengeance mitigates it some, but not that much.
3. I really like pGrim, but mainly because he lives and breathes assassination... and I like that.

Anyways, hope you guys learned something! Point out problems, errors, comments, crits, you name it.